THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NARRATOR: Tonight, you know the news. Now it's time to get to THE POINT with CNN's Margaret Hoover.

MARGARET HOOVER, CNN POLITICAL CONTRIBUTOR: I spent four years in Washington in government service, including two years in the White House. I wrote a national best-selling book about how to save the Republican Party.

NARRATOR: Donny Deutsch.

DONNY DEUTSCH, CHAIRMAN, DEUTSCH INC.: I'm chairman of Deutsch Incorporated, which is one of the world's top ad agencies. I'm the author of two books, "Often Wrong, Never in Doubt" and "The Big Idea."

NARRATOR: Rick Reilly.

RICK REILLY, AUTHOR: I'm an ESPN columnist, essayist and author. I have been covering the world of sports for more than 30 years. Life is just like sports, only with less padding.

NARRATOR: Jason Taylor.

JASON TAYLOR, FORMER PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL PLAYER: I played professional football for 15 years. I played for the Miami Dolphins, as well as the Washington Redskins and the New York Jets. I also majored in political science and criminal justice.

NARRATOR: And Alicia Menendez.

ALICIA MENENDEZ, THE HUFFINGTON POST: I'm a host at HuffPost Live. And for years, I worked in Washington making sure that more young people, Latinos and women are involved in our Democratic process. I want us to have a conversation about what it means to be an American.

NARRATOR: Let's get to THE POINT.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOOVER: Hey, everyone. Welcome to THE POINT. We will be here all week, and you already know the headlines. So now we are going to get to the point of each story.

There's a lot to get to tonight -- Alicia. MENENDEZ: The AP has some new wording around illegal immigration, and I'm wondering, is this a tipping point for America?

TAYLOR: My point is about these college kids that can't handle rejection. Are we raising a generation of whiners?

DEUTSCH: Yes.

REILLY: No.

MENENDEZ: Yes.

HOOVER: My point is about Bill O'Reilly and his using the word Bible thumpers. The question is, is same-sex marriage dividing the GOP?

REILLY: I hope so.

DEUTSCH: My point is, why did it take them so long to fire that Rutgers basketball coach who was caught on videotape literally abusing his players? And don't we need to hold his bosses accountable.

(CROSSTALK)

REILLY: They had the tape since November.

My point is about the rapper Jay-Z. No disrespect, Donny, but is he America's greatest businessman?

DEUTSCH: No.

HOOVER: Yes. And we're going to talk about it.

But first we're going to get to the top story of the evening, which is Mark Sanford, who has won his runoff in South Carolina Congressional District 1. The question is, is adultery becoming OK? Have we totally forgiven adultery? Or does it matter anymore?

(CROSSTALK)

REILLY: This is a guy who cheated on his wife, who disappeared for six days, left his seat wide open.

HOOVER: Where did he go again?

REILLY: He said he was hiking the Appalachian Trail. He was actually in Buenos Aires, which is a little bit south of the Appalachian Trail.

MENENDEZ: I think it matters to the voters of South Carolina and I think nationally it matters to voters because you have someone who has built his entire career on being a person of faith, who made moral judgments about who other people should be able to have sex with, who they should be able to love, who they should be able to marry. And now we know he has a lover in Argentina.

HOOVER: With that, who now is in South Carolina and was at his victory speech last night. He interviewed -- Jake Tapper interviewed him today at the top of Jake's show. We're going to hear what he said to Jake Tapper.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK SANFORD (R), FORMER SOUTH CAROLINA GOVERNOR: I think the political opponents naturally enough will want to make any event define your life.

And what I think we find, whether it's you or me or any of us out there, we will have different events when we wish we could have done things differently, when we wish we could handled them better, but in fact they help us to ultimately refine our lives and make us that much better a person, maybe walk out into the arena of politics a bit more humble than we were before.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

REILLY: It helped me. This guy is the god of philanderers. If you're a philanderer, this is the guy. He's going to get his old job back, probably. He had the woman he cheated with, with him there. He asked his ex-wife to run his campaign. It's like nothing ever happened.

DEUTSCH: Let me put this in a little perspective. Let me say why he may not be dead. Obviously adultery is wrong. The real crime was leaving his office, the adultery.

There's what I call a scandal continuum in this country. We're so used to hearing about movie stars who make their children with their maids while they're living at home to politicians who go into men's room and have forays in the bathrooms that adultery, which almost 50 percent of the people do in this country, which is obviously wrong, somehow we may be a little more desensitized to, except it's South Carolina. That's his problem.

HOOVER: You're wrong on two points. I will tell you exactly why. Two points.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: First of all, Mark Sanford is no philanderer. He's a guy who genuinely fell in love with another woman. Not a good thing when you're married and you're governor and you have four children. But there are a lot of philandering politicians around. I have met them a ton of them.

I actually have met mars too. He's actually not a philandering guy. Point number two where you're wrong...

REILLY: So he cheated but he's not a cheater.

HOOVER: No, no, but you said philanderer, as though he has a propensity for this, he's always doing it. There's a difference. But let's not get into the nuances.

Let me tell you the second point where you're wrong, which is he's actually running a campaign which is -- he's basically running for redemption. This is the Mark Sanford's apology tour. Because it's important to South Carolina voters, because they're more religious as Donny points out, this matters to them.

By asking for their votes, he's asking for redemption. And the question -- this is generally a safe Republican seat which may end up going to a Democrat. Stephen Colbert's sister is running for the seat as a Democrat. And she's pulling ahead or even with him, which is unheard of, because maybe she will get the women's vote. The women in South Carolina are not quite ready to vote for Mark Sanford.

(CROSSTALK)

TAYLOR: He will lose a majority probably of the female vote. That's understandable.

But I think America as a whole is a forgiving nation. I understand the further you get away from a situation, the more people forget and forgive. And this is still kind of wrong in some people's minds, but I think we forgive.

The man made a mistake. It's obvious he made a mistake. I'm not going to make light of that. As Donny said, adultery is very wrong. But if you're looking at someone like Bill Clinton, who did it while in office, the highest office in our nation, people liked him, so I think he -- it was a little easier for people to forgive him.

This is not adultery, but people do not like Lance Armstrong, so they're ready to crucify I Lance Armstrong.

(CROSSTALK)

MENENDEZ: If you're going to go on an apology tour, Bill Clinton went on the correct apology tour, albeit a little belated, and he got his wife on his side. And they stayed together.

(CROSSTALK)

MENENDEZ: In the days post-Monica, he spent a lot of his life apologizing for that.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: We can't put up with hypocrisy. And he was on brand. It wasn't a surprise.

What we can't stand is when the Eliot Spitzers, the guys in the white hates, who are holier than though commit adultery. To your point, one point about him and then general adultery, there is a difference although wrong. This was a guy who fell in love and blew up his life. That's a flaw that a lot of people can relate to.

What's working against him is actually what is going on bigger picture in this country with adultery. You know that the mid-'70s, half the country thought adultery could possibly be OK? We have actually, as we're getting more progressive towards gay marriages, now it's going the other way, as far as adultery.

And the reason that's happening is because people are blaming divorce for that.

(CROSSTALK)

MENENDEZ: You don't think it's because more women are now adulterers?

DEUTSCH: No. I think we have gotten more conservative in that area, at the same time we're getting more progressive in the gay area. It's fascinating.

REILLY: Where are all these Christians in the South Carolina who fight about same-sex marriage because it's not in the Bible and now they're voting for this guy?

HOOVER: It was a Republican primary, so we will see what they do in the general when you have got a Democrat and a Republican.

REILLY: The Republicans are quite Christian.

DEUTSCH: Speaking of politics, President Obama today came out and said he's going to give back 5 percent of his salary, retro back to March 1, 5 percent of $400,000.

My point is as a leader, and he's following Chuck Hagel, who did this as defense secretary, is, duh, of course, you do that. But does he get any points with the average person out there who's suffering, who is really feeling the pain of the budget cuts? I don't think so.

TAYLOR: No, he won't get any points for it. It's the right thing to do as a leader. I think it's more symbolic and kind of a P.R. move.

The amount of money is not astronomical. It's not going to affect his lifestyle. But the people that are suffering from budget cuts, whether it be at the airports or in the Department of Defense and all across the nation, I don't think he's going to win any points for it. I like the move. I understand the move. But...

(CROSSTALK)

MENENDEZ: And we all know at a perception level where he won this election. People felt like he understood their lives, their economic realities, that he got them. I think doubles on that narrative.

HOOVER: I know, but that isn't credible.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: The point is, 5 percent of $400,000, most of these guys who are getting furloughed are making $50,000 or $80,000.

TAYLOR: You can't furlough the president.

HOOVER: No, you can't furlough the president.

By the way, it takes an act of Congress to actually decrease the president's salary. That's why he's ending up making a charitable contribution to the U.S. Treasury Department at the end of each month.

REILLY: He's like the Discover card. You get 5 percent back from the guy. I think it's nice.

I think it would be better if he gave 5 percent of his whole salary. Chuck Hagel, for instance, is giving back two weeks' salary. It doesn't come out to much. By the way, he makes five times his salary, because he started a cellular company, he was an investment banker.

If you want to really do something for people, give back 5 percent of your whole salary, the way these government workers are. That's their whole salary.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: One point, one question. I'm sorry. Go ahead.

MENENDEZ: I think the point is does Congress follow his lead?

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: Here's the interesting -- and to that point, our leader seems to be following other people. In the two kind of boldest things he's done, not boldest, the two kind of -- he didn't come out for gay marriage until Biden did it, and he didn't make this move until Hagel did it.

HOOVER: He's leading from behind.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: For whatever that's worth.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: I don't think that Congress follows his lead.

First of all, Congress makes a lot less money than he does. Also members of Congress make a lot of money. They make about $180,000. But they also have to carry two residences, they live in two cities, they travel a lot.

(CROSSTALK)

MENENDEZ: Not all of them have best-selling books.

HOOVER: Not all of them have other ways of making money, although I think the ethics rules prevent them from making money other ways other than their direct salary.

Anyway, look, I personally think the point is that Barack Obama should donate back this money and put it toward the White House tours, so that the White House tours that have been canceled...

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: Now the kids can go for their spring breaks to the White House.

DEUTSCH: That's genius.

(CROSSTALK)

MENENDEZ: We're in a recession, and we're all worried about the White House tours.

(CROSSTALK)

TAYLOR: But I will say this. In 2011, the NFL had a lockout. The commissioner, Roger Goodell, took a pay cut. He went down to $1. He took a $1 salary during the lockout.

Players weren't being paid. Coaches were being put on furlough. People inside the buildings, administrative people, were being put on furloughs. He worked for $1 during the lockout. Like I said, President Obama is going to be OK, and Roger Goodell was OK. Roger Goodell made $29 million last year.

REILLY: I think Bush would have taken the time off. I just wanted to say that.

(LAUGHTER)

REILLY: In three days on this show, we have gotten a little rough with each other, right, but not near as rough as the video you're going to see when we come back on THE POINT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

REILLY: Did you guys see this video that ESPN ran, my network?

They uncovered this video of Mike Rice, the Rutgers coach. Here he is. And he's just abusing his own players, throwing balls at them, calling them all kinds of names. He makes Bobby Knight look like Mr. Rogers.

He got fired today, and well he should. Look at some of these things he's doing. He hits a guy in the head. Yes.

HOOVER: A little homophobic epithet there for you.

REILLY: That odor you're smelling is coaches burning tape all over the nation.

The question is, the A.D. got this tape in late November and yet he's just now fired today. What took so long?

DEUTSCH: I want to know if the president saw that.

First of all, I want to know how the A.D. and president still have their jobs.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: Let me just finish. Did we not live through -- not that this is the same thing as Joe Paterno. But how do these guys -- they saw this, and they gave him I think a little bit of a fine, not that little -- a $50,000 fine. They gave him some time off.

And these are children. These are children. How do either of those men still have their job?

REILLY: The A.D., Tim Pernetti, who I think should be fired for this, got the tape in November. He said he just gave it to the president this week. The president formed a committee or investigators. Who needs a committee? It's so obvious.

MENENDEZ: But Tim Pernetti is taking full responsibility for the fact that he should have done this sooner.

REILLY: He should be fired.

By the way, in New Jersey, at Rutgers, a student killed himself. I don't know if you remember this. The student was abused for...

DEUTSCH: For being gay.

REILLY: And someone used a Webcam to show him having gay sex.

This got the state of New Jersey to enact some of the toughest bullying laws in the country. This guy should be hyper-aware of what's going on.

HOOVER: Precisely.

And I think the key here and the point is viral video; viral video is now holding Rutgers accountable.

REILLY: Good.

HOOVER: In an age of 24-hour video with all these mediums, I wonder if viral video and videos are not holding us to a higher standard of behavior. And that's a good thing.

TAYLOR: And it shouldn't; it shouldn't take viral video to hold these people accountable.

First of all, the president knew about this. The president was aware of the discipline coming down in November when he was suspended three games and got a $50,000 fine. No president of any university is going to watch his basketball team take the floor and their head coach not be there and not understand why he was not there.

So the president, he needs to be held accountable in this as well. The thing -- the question I have, the point I have, so to speak, is the players are in a very tough situation here because as we sit here and we looked at this in the green room earlier, if this would have happened to me, there's no way.

REILLY: Did it?

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: Did anything like this ever happen to you?

TAYLOR: It has happened to me before with a great, great football coach and a guy that I consider a very close personal friend.

HOOVER: You don't have to name him.

DEUTSCH: Were you a professional?

TAYLOR: I was a professional.

REILLY: Name him.

(CROSSTALK)

TAYLOR: I have done this before in the media. Jimmy Johnson and I got into it once, Jimmy Johnson, the old legendary Dallas coach.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: You're a professional, not that that's OK. You're a professional. These are 18-, 19-year-old kids.

(CROSSTALK)

TAYLOR: Yes. And it was still wrong for a coach at any level to grab a player or hit a player or anything or for a player to do that in return.

REILLY: What did he do?

TAYLOR: He grabbed me. I pushed him off. He grabbed me again. I pushed him off. I just said don't touch me again. He threw me out of the game, told me I was done.

So, five minutes later, I reluctantly gave him kind of a halfway apology. And all was well. We talked about it, it was done. But these are amateurs.

(CROSSTALK)

TAYLOR: I coach youth sports at home. I coach flag football and am around my kids' lacrosse practices and things.

And I hear coaches to 8-, 9-, 10-year-old kids cursing, using the F-word. I have gone up to coaches and told them, look, I don't speak to my kids this way, there's no reason for you to speak to them this way.

For it to get to a point where it becomes violent like this, it's a shame that a video had to come out for this guy to be fired, not in November, but ESPN did it yesterday. And we finally got this guy fired.

DEUTSCH: But it's not just the violence. There seemed to be F- words in there.

HOOVER: They were epithets. They were homophobic epithets.

DEUTSCH: Derogatory to gays. That alone, if you use the N-word, you would be fired, as well you should be. I mean, this is atrocious.

MENENDEZ: Well, while we're on the topic of gay rights, we have an unlikely ally. We have Bill O'Reilly taking Rush Limbaugh and his compatriot Laura Ingraham to task. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL O'REILLY, HOST, "THE O'REILLY FACTOR": The compelling argument is on the side of homosexuals. That's where the compelling argument is. We're Americans. We just want to be treated like everybody else. That is a compelling argument, and to deny that, you have to have a very strong argument on the other side.

(CROSSTALK)

O'REILLY: And the other side hasn't been able to do anything but thump the Bible.

RUSH LIMBAUGH, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: How many of you who watch FOX are Bible thumpers? Do you think there are any "Bible thumpers" that watch FOX? Because last night, you were sort of marginalized on "The Factor."

LAURA INGRAHAM, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: I think when you said they have to do more than Bible thump, I don't think you really needed to say that.

(CROSSTALK)

O'REILLY: Wait, wait, wait. No, no, no, we're going to get very specific, as I told you before you went on the air.

INGRAHAM: Yes. I am going to get specific. If you let me talk, I will get specific. Can I finish my sentence?

O'REILLY: No.

INGRAHAM: May I?

O'REILLY: Because you made two statements that are fallacious. And I'm going to correct them.

There's no feud between me and Limbaugh. I don't talk to Limbaugh, I have never said anything about Limbaugh on this program.

(CROSSTALK)

INGRAHAM: I'm talking about the feud about the issue.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(CROSSTALK)

MENENDEZ: Don't you miss the paternalism of Bill O'Reilly?

HOOVER: You and I both have had great days with Bill O'Reilly.

MENENDEZ: But this is a growing pains for the right. It's an important conversation, and it's one it's time for them to have.

HOOVER: I have been working on this issue from the center-right for a long time.

The truth is there's no -- people like to say there's a civil war in the GOP. You know, people in the GOP, they know there's no civil war. The truth is, this is way more of a generational issue than it is a partisan issue. If you take -- 52 percent of Republicans under the age of 50 are in favor of same-sex marriage. This is more much generational.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: Day by day, they're dropping one by one. We had Rob Portman, and now we have Mark Kirk. Then you have perhaps Senator Murkowski and Susan Collins who seem to be thinking about this as well.

That's frankly reflective of the direction the country is going. People are thinking about the issue. They're thinking about the gay people in their lives. And they're thinking about not marriage as a religious issue, but marriage as a civil issue. Civil marriage and religious marriage are different. Right?

And under the eyes of the law, the argument that people are making is that everyone should have the right to get married under the law. And religion, you can do your own thing. No religion should be forced to marry anyone.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: This is a demographic certainty.

It's not even up for discussion anymore. When you look at things, for instance, that 72 percent of Hispanics voted Democrat, that we now see 33 percent of people have actually changed their mind on same-sex marriage, this is no longer -- and I think what O'Reilly is hinting at is that, guys, this is basically a business decision at this point.

It's not even up for discussion. If we ever want to -- by the way, I want to take a shower after watching all those guys.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: Let me finish. Let me finish.

That it is not up for discussion. If a Republican ever wants to get elected in a general election again, they have got to move off the social issues. That is an arithmetic polling certainty.

MENENDEZ: But how do you get there? Talk about the wing of the party that is more libertarian?

HOOVER: Look, I think there's a lot of conversations happening within the context of the Republican Party about how the Republican Party is going to reform.

I think Rand Paul has laid out a path forward, that this is a states' rights issue, let the states figure it out. Some people disagree with that approach. But, look, I don't like saying that this is a settled issue, because it doesn't give Americans room to breathe and have a conversation about it.

That's what we really need in order to sort of move on an issue. You have to be able to have conversations about this. It's OK if there's disagreement even around this table on the issue. I think the important thing is to have thoughtful conversations about it.

TAYLOR: Is the GOP having that? Is there a civil war in the GOP?

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: I work on this issue religiously, no pun intended.

(LAUGHTER)

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: I'm going to give the Republicans the advice. It's very simple. They have to redefine conservatism. Conservatism at its core is about rugged individualism.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: Did you read my book?

DEUTSCH: Yes. No, actually.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: That's what my book is about.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: Do you know who has got rugged individualism?

I'm going to give you a hint.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: Was that Reagan?

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: For those of you at home that don't know, whoever has a great-grandfather who was president of the United States at this table, raise your hand. Her.

This is Herbert Hoover's great-granddaughter. We're going to just listen to all this.

REILLY: But you're missing the whole point of this, which is on the left, it's great to watch the Republicans come apart.

It's a mess. The other thing is, I love it when -- the only reason I would ever praise Bill O'Reilly is that he's at least open- minded, unlike Rush Limbaugh. He changed on the Iraq war, he changed on same-sex marriage, he has changed on immigration.

Do you ever hear Limbaugh change anything? At least this guy has the guts to say, I was wrong. This is a guy that said, next, you will marry goats, and now he's for it.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: I'm going to tell you exactly who is changing, because it's going to lead into our next segment.

REILLY: Please do.

HOOVER: The AP is changing. The AP is changing. We may be at a tipping point.

But it's Wednesday, and so we have a tipping point segment. We're going to get to it when we come back to THE POINT.

REILLY: We always do that on Wednesday.

HOOVER: Yes.

(LAUGHTER)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) HOOVER: So it's Wednesday. We have our tipping point segment on Wednesday, because we're halfway through the week.

DEUTSCH: As we always do on Wednesday.

HOOVER: As we always do on Wednesday.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: So, the question is AP has changed its style guide. They have struck permanently the term illegal immigrant from their style guide. They will no longer use this anywhere. They will also incidentally no longer use the term unauthorized worker of unauthorized document for immigrant.

(CROSSTALK)

Do you have a problem with this?

REILLY: Well, I'm a writer, and I like words that are descriptive.

These words were fine. I don't see the big problem with changing this.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: But you see the problem with illegal alien?

REILLY: Yes, I didn't say alien.

It's all euphemism. It all changes. So now I hear people have trouble with undocumented immigrant, because they have documents, just not the ones that get them into this country free. My question is, what's next? We don't like that. How about unprocessed, foot traveling visitor?

We could do alternative border entry guest? What's next? It never ends with...

MENENDEZ: You call them undocumented.

And I think my friends who don't have papers with disagree with your assessment, because when you want to have a conversation about comprehensive immigration reform, it is impossible when you think of the people that you are talking about, the 11 million, 12 million people living in the shadows of America as people who are themselves illegal.

Did they do something illegal? Absolutely. Are they themselves illegal? Absolutely not.

(CROSSTALK)

REILLY: You're just splitting hairs.

MENENDEZ: No, because you can't move the conversation if people are stuck on that law and order piece.

REILLY: If we say all pro Jason Taylor, we don't mean he's all pro in kitchen and in bed or whatever. He was in football. But it's just a descriptive way to say it.

DEUTSCH: Let me challenge the words. It's interesting. We all say it's just words until it's words about us.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: And that's very interesting because I have gotten caught. I have said things that have offended people. And I was like, well, I didn't mean it that way, and they are just words, but to them -- so that's the rub in this.

HOOVER: And the difference is, are you talking about words that describe a person or words that describe an action?

And you're a pro football player. Are you a pro?

TAYLOR: Used to be. I try to be a pro at everything I do.

But I understand there's sensitivities to the words that are being used. And, look, if it's offensive, we will try to change it. I think the AP made a move in going in that right direction and getting us to stop using the word illegal unless you do something illegal.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: Did they go too far? Because the question is, they're not even going to use -- at CNN, we use unauthorized worker.

The AP is not even going to do that, so is that going too far, Alicia?

MENENDEZ: No, because they're authorized by lots of American businesses.

HOOVER: So then what do you use?

(CROSSTALK)

MENENDEZ: You use undocumented.

HOOVER: But they're not going to use the word undocumented either, they said in the press release.

(CROSSTALK)

MENENDEZ: ... going to call us Americans?

HOOVER: But what are you going to call them?

(CROSSTALK) DEUTSCH: Strategically, if you're on the right, interestingly enough, and you feel very firm, the less offensive you're referring, the more room you have to make -- get things done, in effect, because you're not kind of putting them at corners.

So, ironically, if you're fighting against immigration, tone down the rhetoric and actually call them the most positive thing.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: Then it doesn't seem that you're going after them.

MENENDEZ: And the inverse is true for the left.

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: That's true, yes.

MENENDEZ: If you're trying to persuade someone on the right on this issue, your best bet is to call them illegal immigrants, because that is a word that they know.

Pictures of him just showed up with him holding hands with his boyfriend. He is holding a man purse or something. He's openly gay, proud of it. His parents, Magic, who is one of the greatest guy in the world, wife, Cookie. Of course, we support him. We support everything we do.

And the interesting tipping point today is Kobe Bryant came out and said, well, of course his parents are for him and of course he should be able to do what he would do.

And, Jason, there has been so much discussion about not kind of touching the gay issue in sports. Is this a tipping point now that one of the greatest stars of our time is pretty much of course coming out, like, duh, what's the problem?

TAYLOR: I think any time a LeBron James, a Kobe Bryant, and Jay- Z, guys like that, people that can move the needle in social issues or fashion or what's cool to do, swag, so to speak, issues, I think it's a big tipping point.

So, Kobe -- we expect Magic Johnson to support his son and his wife, Cookie, to support her son. And they should. But I think it's great that Kobe came out and took a stance and kind of stood up there for -- Kobe Bryant is a household name all over the country, all over the world.

REILLY: But you know where that's coming from.

TAYLOR: No, hold on -- all over the world. So, for Kobe to come out and do this, I think it's fantastic. You're going to say, Kobe's a Laker, and he's friends with Magic and all that.

REILLY: No, what I was going to say, I'm about to tell you.

TAYLOR: All right, great. I can't wait.

REILLY: Kobe was a guy who called a ref the "F" word, instead of "fairy," a worse word than that, and got disciplined by the NBA. And he took -- he had to take some training classes. He's come around on it, much like Bill O'Reilly on same-sex marriage.

So he is very sensitive about the whole gay thing. And so he went out of his way to say this yesterday and today.

TAYLOR: ... make it disingenuous if you say he came out -- to preface it with all those other things, I just think it's not fair to Kobe Bryant. He's changed.

I understand, people change. People change.

DEUTSCH: I want to ask you an important question. A lot of people said, "Oh, if an openly gay player came out in a locker room, it would affect the locker room." You've been in locker rooms your whole life. If all of a sudden a Miami Dolphin or a New York Jet said he likes guys, are there any players that are going to care at this point?

TAYLOR: I think there's a segment of professional sports society, so to speak, that still has an issue with it. We saw it evidenced in the Super Bowl, some of the pre-Super Bowl interviews, and it came up.

But I think -- I would like to think the majority of guys would be understanding nowadays, would be more tolerant, be understanding that people do things differently in life. And let's find a way to make it work. We can't -- we can't keep excluding people from doing things that we don't like.

MENENDEZ: From your mouth to Laura Ingraham's ears.

HOOVER: Rick.

REILLY: So we all have regrets. This is a "Tipping Point" question. Tattoos.

There was this guy, Ryan Cabrera, a singer. He got a Ryan Gosling tattoo.

And here's what happened. They were playing a thing in Vegas called tattoo roulette. You have to -- you get drunk, and I pick your tattoo for you. You pick your tattoo for me. We can't look until it's done. And he ends up with a Ryan Gosling tattoo. So my question is: Is everyone going to realize how dumb some tattoos are?

TAYLOR: So what would you pick for me?

REILLY: I would definitely...

TAYLOR: Don't answer that. Go ahead. Go ahead.

DEUTSCH: Does anybody on the panel have a tattoo? Does anybody have any tattoos on the panel?

MENENDEZ: I should because I'm a millennial, but I don't.

HOOVER: Forty percent -- 40 percent of millennials have a tattoo; 20 percent of them have more than one. The majority of them are small, and they're also hidden, so they're in very discrete places, not their ankles or their necks.

REILLY: I have a tattoo, by the way. You don't have any tattoos.

HOOVER: I do not have a tattoo.

REILLY: I have a tattoo. Every male in our family has the same tattoo on their right shoulder.

DEUTSCH: Which is what?

MENENDEZ: I thought you were going to say you have every male in your family.

DEUTSCH: What is it? What did you say?

REILLY: It's our family crest from Ireland.

DEUTSCH: There you go. OK.

HOOVER: All right. But we're not staying there.

DEUTSCH: We're going to go off family crest and actually, the thing about families is that, with a lot of kids who didn't get into college -- this is an interesting story. A young woman wrote an op-ed piece in "The Wall Street Journal," complaining about not getting into college. A lot of parents complaining to admissions officers, "Why didn't my kid get in?" Are we a nation of whiners? When we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DEUTSCH: All right, guys. Guys, fascinating story out there, New York University. The kids all just got their college acceptances or rejections this week. And New York University has said that there has been thousands and thousands and thousands of angry phone calls from parents: "How could my kid not get in?" HOOVER: Like a record number?

DEUTSCH: Like insane, and kids calling up, and it's this -- to me, it brings up an issue, is -- is this generation today so entitled that rejection can't even be an option?

You know, I'm running an agency, and I've seen generation of kids come through. And I do see a difference in today's kids that they expect, you know, the corner office at the beginning. I don't know if they -- because they've been reading about billionaires at the age of 24. But are kids today just more entitled and more spoiled?

HOOVER: There's been a lot of research about the millennial generation. And there's a lot of very good things about them. But one of the downsides about this generation is people say, is that they have grown up in an environment where they all got a trophy for showing up. It's the trophy participation generation.

DEUTSCH: Exactly.

HOOVER: And so you can see how that might fuel the sentiment, "But I did everything right. How come I didn't get into this college?" And then this mock outrage.

REILLY: We can't have dodge ball any more in gym class because somebody might be out.

My sister is an elementary school principal. She said that no one plays tag anymore, because it pokes one person as "out." It's like now everybody plays "duck, duck, duck, duck." Like nobody is the goose. You know what I mean? The parents are the ones who are -- they think every kid is gifted and talented.

MENENDEZ: But it's not just the parents. For those of us who grew up in the '80s, we grew up wearing our seatbelts. We grew up -- we couldn't ride a bicycle unless you wore a helmet. All of these child safety laws that came out when we were coming of age. And the fact that we came of age in the wake of September 11 really gave us this risk aversion, and it has shaped our views on foreign policy. It's also shaped our thoughts on ourselves and whether or not we deserve to get into some of these elite institutions.

I just think you need to understand how you manage millennials. We want feedback. We want to work in teams. We want to be excellent. And we want to do that for you. So if you're an employer, take that, harness it, make it work for you.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: That is the millennial attitude incarnate. DEUTSCHE: I have to tell you, I've employed thousands and thousands and thousands of young people over the last 25 years. There is a difference today. You're really -- you're going to have to trust me on it. There is.

And I also think there's a -- you brought up a point about parents. It's interesting. There's a fine line, because we all want to tell our kids they can do anything, and they're the greatest. You want to build them up, but there is that line between no, you can't do everything, and there is a reality, and you're not going to always win. That's a great point.

TAYLOR: Exactly. We all want to be. There's a problem when parents want to be their kids' best friends. That's where you find the problem. Everyone wants to be their kids' -- not everybody. Some parents want to be their kids' best friends.

Your job is to be a parent. And part of parenting is building them up, encouraging them, telling them to be whatever they want to be. But also having to deal with adversity, having to deal with being -- not even -- why can't you be told no? Trust me, I've seen plenty of kids around this world that cannot be told no. When you tell them no, they go crazy.

So you didn't get into -- you didn't get into NYU.

MENENDEZ: Really?

DEUTSCH: Let's let...

TAYLOR: If you ask who -- you should have applied to Princeton anyway. You applied to the wrong school.

HOOVER: ... the resident millennial.

MENENDEZ: I just hope my mother's watching. Because she always says that it's her fault that I am ruined for life, because she told me how great I am.

HOOVER: What did you learn from that?

(CROSSTALK)

DEUTSCH: Interesting point, interesting point. "Wall Street Journal," a young lady named Susie Lee Weiss (ph) wrote to "The Wall Street Journal": "Colleges tell you just be yourself. That is great advice as long as yourself has nine extracurriculars, six leadership positions, three varsity sports, killer SAT scores, and two moms."

To me, that's -- that's spoiled milk. And you have to love your kids enough to let them fail on the way so they don't end up like this.

TAYLOR: That's how you grow.

MENENDEZ: You also want to go to a college where you belong. If they don't want you, you don't want them.

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: No crying in baseball.

TAYLOR: And change my year (ph) to business, because they're coming out of school soon.

REILLY: Speaking of baseball, I coached Little League baseball for 13 years. One time, I was hitting ground balls to a kid. And he wasn't doing it; he couldn't do it. And I was trying to get him comfortable with it. His mother came on the field and said, "You're singling out my kid and you're destroying his confidence."

I'm like, no, I'm just getting him to learn...

HOOVER: That's helicopter parenting.

REILLY: That's what it is, helicopter parent. These parents are calling the admissions office at NYU saying, "How could you possibly leave my child out?"

TAYLOR: Let me say this in closing: Welcome to the real world. These kids are grown up in different households and being taken care of. These -- these 17-year-old kids that are coming into college, they didn't get in. Welcome to the real world.

DEUTSCH: Welcome to the real world.

TAYLOR: You will be rejected again.

DEUTSCH: You've got to love them enough to let them fail.

REILLY: Speaking of the real world, there's crime in the real world, right?

Yesterday there was a huge crime right in broad daylight. Jay-Z did it, we're going to tell you what happened.

HOOVER: What?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

REILLY: The rapper Jay-Z, now he did something pretty amazing in the world of sports. He marched into the world of baseball and took one of the best free agents in the whole game away from Scott Boris, who's the No. 1 sports agent in baseball. He took Robinson Cano from the New York Yankees, who will be the No. 1 free agent next year when his contract is done this year.

So the question is, Jay-Z as an agent, all the other things he's done right. The clothing, marrying Beyonce, fabulous artist, owning part of the Brooklyn Nets. Can he be a sports agent?

DEUTSCH: He can be a part owner of a very successful sports agency. He is a brilliant guy and an amazing story. This is a guy who grew up in Brooklyn, drugs. Now, as far as I'm concerned, is the ultimate symbol of American achievable success. This is a guy -- I mean, and what his business strategy has been brilliant.

He understands that, because he owns that essence, that when he puts it next to any business, whether it is a clothing line, whether it is a sports agency, A, it's going to open up every door in the world; B, if he puts his name next to -- next to the Brooklyn Nets, all of a sudden, they're cool. So he is finding the right business partners.

He actually tried to steal someone from my agency to go into business with. True story. He's a terrific guy. That's the brilliance of his strategy. Partner up with the right people.

So is he going to be in there negotiating contracts? No, but he will own a very successful sports agency.

MENENDEZ: Does that mean he learned the lessons of Master P?

TAYLOR: Well, I'm sure he's been down that road and understood what Master P did. For those of you that don't know, Master P at one point had negotiated Ricky Williams' contract, running back from the University of Texas. It was -- it was a disaster, a horrible deal. Master P was in unchartered waters, a little deeper than he could really handle, and it turned out poorly.

But I think Jay-Z understands. As Donny said, he's brilliant at knowing what he can and cannot do. Yes, he owns a part of a sports agency. He's also a partner with CAA, a very established sports agency, that represents some of the top athletes in our country. So Jay-Z has a fantastic story. A guy that -- he -- he is part of the Brooklyn Nets, the same streets where he was selling drugs, before.

HOOVER: Exactly.

TAYLOR: Where he had been arrested for selling drugs. Came all the way up through the ladder, you know, and now -- music career, the clothing line, Beyonce. I mean, he aligns himself with Barack Obama. If you ask me, at the inauguration, Jay-Z and Beyonce were the stars. I understand Barack Obama was being inaugurated.

HOOVER: Jay-Z for president!

TAYLOR: I mean, Jay-Z might not be able to run for president because the right -- excuse me, the right side would probably tear him down, but...

DEUTSCH: Let me tell you why he has the potential to make billions and billions and billions. I had a partnership with Russell Simmons at the ad agency, and what that allowed me to do as a top agency, call up Budweiser: "You want to meet Russell?"

Now ratchet that up tenfold, because Jay-Z's a superstar. He will continue to partner with tech companies, what not. He will end up with billions and billions. He will be one of the great business leaders of our time.

HOOVER: To me, I think the story is in the symbolism, that you have this modern American dream come to fruition.

TAYLOR: Yes.

HOOVER: The question is, is he America's greatest New Age businessman?

DEUTSCH: He's brilliant at what he does, but I still don't think he will go down as America's greatest businessman...

HOOVER: Well, he's certainly pop culture's greatest businessman.

DEUTSCH: I think he's the greatest symbol of pop culture and everything that's great about America. He's not America's greatest businessman.

REILLY: You know what he can do that other guys can't do? He put Lebron James' name in a lyric. He's put a lot of athletes' names in his lyrics. "Hey, Sign with me. I'll put you in a song."

TAYLOR: I don't know. I don't know. Sounds trashy.

DEUTSCH: If you were hiring someone to run Apple or Procter & Gamble, would Jay-Z be your guy? And that's the way I describe it. No.

MENENDEZ: No, would I want his...

(CROSSTALK)

TAYLOR: Yes.

DEUTSCH: That's my point. Yes.

HOOVER: He's a huge celebrity. Capitalize on the celebrity.

TAYLOR: Yes, absolutely.

REILLY: So you know what his marketing pitch is to these athletes, right? He's going after athletes who haven't won titles, and he's promising to put a ring on it.

DEUTSCH: The comedy stylings of Rick Reilly. Which way to the Tiki Room? TAYLOR: Where do we even go from there?

HOOVER: I have no idea. I think -- I think we have our next segment coming up next. What's the next segment, Donny?

TAYLOR: There's no real segue.

DEUTSCH: Donny's teasing.

TAYLOR: There's no real segue from Jay-Z to the next point. Let me put it this way: 12 million Americans believe this country is run by lizard people. Don't ask me, but we'll tell you more when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAYLOR: If you think it's weird having Bill O'Reilly fighting with Rush Limbaugh or people getting Ryan Gosling tattoos, get a load of this.

Public Policy Polling asked about 1,200 Americans, registered voters, about conspiracy theories. And the results are phenomenal. Forty-four million people believe Big Foot really exists? OK.

DEUTSCH: The guy who shot the picture said he faked it.

TAYLOR: They didn't -- they didn't get that memo. Sixty-six million people believe a UFO crashed at Roswell. I've heard that plenty of times.

But my question here is, and I know this is bizarre. But is America being run by lizard people? Whatever that is. That America is being run by lizard people.

HOOVER: A lot of people believe America is being run by lizard people. Well, they look a lot like Rick.

REILLY: Thanks for nothing.

TAYLOR: I guess you were one of the 1,200 people they called.

DEUTSCH: You know what, guys? And this really tells us about polling, too. You ask enough people. Also, 7 percent of voters thought the moon landing was faked. Five percent think Paul McCartney died in 1996 or 1966. So I think we ask enough people...

TAYLOR: Myths.

DEUTSCH: And it's a barber poll. But why?

MENENDEZ: I also wonder if -- the Internet has sort of double downed on this, in the sense that we all know that people subscribe to these theories in part because of cognitive dissonance. That even if, you know, you know something is true, you then go out and search for things that mean it's true, and you reject facts that contradict the narrative you already have in your mind. You want to prove something's true, there is something on the Internet for everyone.

HOOVER: There is a tendency for people, especially when it's a horrific historic event, to need to believe psychologically that there are larger forces at play, that this wasn't an act of violence or, like, al Qaeda ; the people who believe that 9/11 was an inside job somehow. I think there's a psychological need for people to believe that there are more malevolent forces at work.

DEUTSCH: So what's the stuff behind those who believe there are lizard people?

HOOVER: Well, the lizard -- that somehow there isn't chaos in the earth, that there's a greater order at play.

REILLY: My wife used to be a high school teacher. She said high-school kids are crazy about conspiracy theories. And the reason is they're trying to rebel. And I think in this society so many people want to say, no, global warming is a myth; it's a hoax. It's a conspiracy. Paul McCartney's still alive, you know...

HOOVER: Kennedy assassination.

REILLY: Kennedy...

TAYLOR: That was No. 1.

HOOVER: It's not a conspiracy.

DEUTSCH: There was a time in this country...

Explain the bullets. How -- there had to be two shooters. What do you mean there wasn't a conspiracy?

(CROSSTALK)

HOOVER: Alicia, bonus points.

MENENDEZ: I want to give my bonus points to Mark Cuban for the most ingenious P.R. stunt. He says he's going to draft or consider drafting a woman, Brittney Griner, to the Mavericks. She's 6'8", 14 dunks. She's a real pro. I just -- I don't buy it, guys.

REILLY: Of course not.

MENENDEZ: It's a stunt, right?

REILLY: There's no way she can play in the NBA.

TAYLOR: It sounds good. It sounds good. The commissioner in basketball said within 10 years there could be a female NBA player. You know what? It's much like Barack Obama giving back 5 percent. It's...

MENENDEZ: It's a stunt.

TAYLOR: It's a P.R. stunt. It's a good thing, but we'll see what happens.

My bonus point goes to Eric Murdock. He's a former all-American at Providence. He played nine years in the NBA. He was actually hired by Rutgers Coach Mike Rice to be the director of player development.

Now, Mike Rice should have hired him to be the director of coaching development. But Eric Murdoch is the guy that kind of outed the tape to ESPN to ultimately get this guy fired. It should have been done months ago back in November, but good for Eric Murdoch. And he did not get his contract renewed by the coach, obviously. So he's taken a hit.

HOOVER: My bonus point goes to senator from Illinois, Mark Kirk. He's a Republican. He's the second Republican in the Senate to come out in favor of same-sex marriage in the last few weeks. And it's particularly pivotal for the state of Illinois right now, whose legislature is considering passing same-sex marriage. It's already passed in one of the houses. It's up in the other states -- up in the other houses. So if it passes, then Illinois will be the tenth state to pass same-sex marriage.

It's great to have a Republican from a pivotal state at a pivotal time before the Supreme Court decides.

DEUTSCH: It's happening.

HOOVER: So -- but yes. Kudos to him. Bonus points to Mark Kirk.

DEUTSCH: My bonus point, Jay Leno. We talked about it last night on the show. Obviously, today announced that he'll be stepping down at the end of his contract, Fallon taking over.

Here's a guy that has handled it with such elegance and dignity, from doing the video last night to tonight saying -- today coming out and saying, "I wish Jimmy luck, and I hope he's in his chair. An old guy like me, I'm going to the garage."

Jay Leno will still have a lot to do in front of him. He went out on top, and he's not going anywhere.

REILLY: It was classy.

My bonus point, Brian Banks. He was 16 years old, on the Long Beach Poly High School football team. He was wrongly convicted of rape, spent six years in jail. The woman came out and recanted.

He's just got signed by the Atlanta Falcons of the NFL.

MENENDEZ: Wow.

REILLY: It's the greatest comeback story of the decade. And -- so it's just great for him. He's a friend of mine, and I'm very happy for him. We're going back to the center of the earth now to be with the lizard people. "AC 360" is next.